ben connor sat in his room overlooking the crossing of the streets. it was by no means the ramshackle huddle of lean-to's that he had expected, for lukin was built to withstand a siege of january snows and storm-winds which were scooped by the mountains into a funnel that focused straight on the village. besides, lukin was no accidental, crossroads town, but the bank, store, and amusement center of a big country. the timber was being swept from the black mountain; there were fairly prosperous mines in the vicinity; and cattlemen were ranging their cows over the plateaus more and more during the spring and summer. therefore, lukin boasted two parallel main streets, and a cross street, looking forward to the day when it should be incorporated and have a mayor of its own. at present it had a moving-picture house and a dance hall where a hundred and fifty couples could take the floor at once; above all, it had jack townsend's hotel. this was a stout, timber building of two stories, the lower portion of which was occupied by the restaurant, the drug store, the former saloon now transformed into an ice-cream parlor, and other public places.
it was dark, but the night winds had not yet commenced, and lukin sweltered with a heat more unbearable than full noon.
it was nothing to ben connor, however, for he was fresh from the choking summer nights of manhattan, and in lukin, no matter how hot it became, the eye could always find a cool prospect. it had been unpleasant enough when the light was burning, for the room was done in a hot, orange-colored paper, but when he blew out the lamp and sat down before the window he forgot the room and let his glance go out among the mountains. a young moon drifted across the corner of his window, a sickle of light with a dim, phosphorescent line around the rest of the circle. it was bright enough to throw the peaks into strong relief, and dull enough to let the stars live.
his upward vision had as a rule been limited by the higher stories of some skyscraper, and now his eye wandered with a pleasant sense of freedom over the snow summits where he could imagine a cold wind blowing through reach after reach of the blue-gray sky. it pleased and troubled ben connor very much as one is pleased and troubled by the first study of a foreign language, with new prospects opening, strange turns of thought, and great unknown names like stars. but after a time ben connor relaxed. the first cool puff moved across his forehead and carried him halfway to a dreamless sleep.
here a chorus of mirth burst up at him from the street, men's voices pitched high and wild, the almost hysterical laughter of people who are much alone. in manhattan only drunken men laughed like this. among the mountains it did not irritate ben connor; in tune with the rest, it was full of freedom. he looked down to the street, and seeing half a dozen bearded fellows frolic in the shaft of light from a window, he decided that people kept their youth longer in lukin.
all things seemed in order to connor, this night. he rolled his sleeves higher to let all the air that stirred get at his bulky forearms, and then lighted a cigar. it was a dark, oily havana—it had cost him a great deal in money and nerves to acquire that habit—and he breathed the scent deep while he waited for the steady wind which jack townsend had promised. there was just enough noise to give the silence that waiting quality which cannot be described; below him voices murmured, and lifted now and then, rhythmically. ben connor thought the sounds strangely musical, and he began to brim with the same good nature which puffed the cheeks of jack townsend. there was a substantial basis for that content in the broiled trout which he had had for dinner. it was while his thoughts drifted back to those browned fish that the first wind struck him. dust with an acrid scent whirled up from the street—then a steady stream of air swept his face and arms.
it was almost as if another personality had stepped into the room. the sounds from the street fell away, and there was the rustling of cloth somewhere, the cool lifting of hair from his forehead, and an odd sense of motion—as if the wind were blowing through him. but something else came with the breeze, and though he noted it at first with only a subconscious discontent, it beat gradually into his mind, a light ticking, very rapid, and faint, and sounding in an irregular rhythm. he wanted to straighten out that rhythm and make the flutter of tapping regular. then it began to take on a meaning; it framed words.
"philip lord, jailed for embezzlement."
"hell!" burst out ben connor. "the telegraph!"
he started up from his chair, feeling betrayed, for that light, irregular tapping was the voice of the world from which he had fled. a hard, cool mind worked behind the gray eyes of ben connor, but as he fingered the cigar his brain was fumbling at a large idea. forty-second and broadway was calling him back.
when he looked out the window, now, the mountains were flat shapes against a flat sky, with no more meaning than a picture.
the sounder was chattering: "kid lane wins title in eighth round. lucky punch dethrones lightweight champion." ben connor swallowed hard and found that his throat was dry. he was afraid of himself—afraid that he would go back. he was recalled from his ugly musing by the odor of the cigar, which had burned out and was filling the room with a rank smell; he tossed the crumbled remnants through the window, crushed his hat upon his head, and went down, collarless, coatless, to get on the street in the sound of men's voices. if he had been in manhattan he would have called up a pal; they would have planned an evening together; but in lukin—
at the door below he glared up and down the street. there was nothing to see but a light buggy which rolled noiselessly through the dust. a dog detached itself from behind the vehicle and came to bark furiously at his feet. the kicking muscles in connor's leg began to twitch, but a voice shouted and the mongrel trotted away, growling a challenge over its shoulder. the silence fell once more. he turned and strode back to the desk of the hotel, behind which jack townsend sat tilted back in his chair reading a newspaper.
"what's doing in this town of yours to-night?" he asked.
the proprietor moistened a fat thumb to turn the page and looked over his glasses at connor.
"appears to me there ain't much stirrin' about," he said. "except for the movies down the street. you see, everybody's there."
"movies," muttered connor under his breath, and looked savagely around him.
what his eyes fell on was a picture of an old, old man on the wall, and the rusted stove which stood in the center of the room with a pipe zigzagging uncertainly toward the ceiling. everything was out of order, broken down—like himself.
"looks to me like you're kind of off your feet," said jack townsend, and he laid down his paper and looked wistfully at his guest. he made up his mind. "if you're kind of dry for a drink," he said, "i might rustle you a flask of red-eye—"
"whisky?" echoed connor, and moistened his lips. then he shook his head. "not that."
he went back to the door with steps so long and heavy that jack townsend rose from his chair, and spreading his hands on the desk, peered after the muscular figure.
"that gent is a bad hombre," pronounced jack to himself. he sat down again with a sigh, and added: "maybe."
at the door connor was snarling: "quiet? sure; like a grave!"
the wind freshened, fell away, and the light, swift ticking sounded again more clearly. it mingled with the alkali scent of the dust—manhattan and the desert together. he felt a sense of persecuted virtue. but one of his maxims was: "if anything bothers you, go and find out about it."
ben connor largely used maxims and epigrams; he met crises by remembering what some one else had said. the ticking of the sounder was making him homesick and dangerously nervous, so he went to find the telegrapher and see the sounder which brought the voice of the world into lukin.
a few steps carried him to a screen door through which he looked upon a long, narrow office.
in a corner, an electric fan swung back and forth through a hurried arc and fluttered papers here and there. its whining almost drowned the ticking of the sounder, and ben connor wondered with dull irritation how a tapping which was hardly audible at the door of the office could carry to his room in the hotel. he opened the door and entered.
